We are calling on the government to veto the OOXML format at the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).” The OOXML format is a file specification released by Microsoft in December last year for its Microsoft Office 2007 suite. It is currently in a fast track standardization process with the ISO and will be subject to voting next month. Unlike the current ISO digital document standard ODF (Open Document Format) and China’s national standard UDF (Unified Office Document Format), Microsoft’s OOXML format can only be run on a Windows platform.

It is also criticized for containing many proprietary technologies that can only be fully supported by Microsoft’s Office products.

Knowing how much control Microsoft has in China, heavy lobbying there is only a matter of time. We should keep our eyes open (and Bob might receive some anonymous comments). With so much resistance across the world, Microsoft resorts to changing the theme of the story and painting it all with the brush of “Open Source”.

Sam has explained — essentially by citing yet another OSI/Microsoft analysis — how Microsoft’s involvement in Linux companies and the Open Source community can be used as an illusion that Microsoft has itself become a big fan of openness, transparency, collaboration, and standards. But an illusion is just an illusion. You can put lipstick on a pig, wrap it up with a red dress and then take it out for dinner, but the pig is still a pig, not a girlfriend. Microsoft’s attempt to embrace ‘the other side’ is a destructive and self-serving one. By embracing those who sidle with openness they hope to destroy truly open rivals and promote their lock-ins instead. Watch Silverlight. Behold GNOME/Mono (.NET) entanglements, not just in Novell’s Linux. It will get only worse. In Sam’s own words:

Of course, they are not [Shared Source licenses not open]. Other Shared Source licenses may very well be too restrictive to be considered Open Source. But, Microsoft may conveniently divert the attention from this little detail to the fact that *some* of Shared Source licenses are Open Source.

Remember that the whole thing is a shrewd publicity stunt. It is a shame that OSI board members such as Matt Asay are too blind to see this, let alone react responsibly.

Matt Asay has just blogged and responded to Groklaw’s criticisms. It is understandable that OSI must operate without discrimination (not even when Microsoft is involved). However, as we already know, Microsoft is good at exploiting loopholes and weaknesses in systems which assume that everyone is a gentleman, not an aggressive sociopath.

What I predict we will see will be widespread re-evaluation of national standards body membership and voting rules. I think we’ll witness a normalization of procedures and all have a better idea of the point of those procedures. That is, we want the creation of high quality standards and not just more standards. Quality is more important than quantity.

Wow, consider that, ODF possibly continuing to evolve to handle new project management requirements. Any estimates from readers as to when we’ll have an XML spec for project management from Microsoft show up on ECMA’s doorstep for standardization? Or, how about everyone just works together starting RIGHT NOW to extend ODF to handle this functionality?

Those who do it first cannot necessarily capitalise on de facto ‘standards’, but it is worth a shot.

Share this post:These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.

Pages that cross-reference this one

2 Comments

I completely agree with your analysis. I also agree with the ‘sociopath’ descriptive. Microsoft, Walmart, oil companies, automotive companies and others like them are completely immoral, unethical organizations. The primary function of these organizations is to make obscenely wealthy people even more obscenely wealthy at the expense of the quality of life for everyone else. These organizations have single-handedly destroyed the concept and application of free enterprise and democracy. My impression is that now we live in a theocracy. Our god is wealth and you can guess who the high priests are.

The lunacy of the EPO with its patent maximalism will likely go unchecked (and uncorrected) if Battistelli gets his way and turns the EPO into another SIPO (Croatian in the human rights sense and Chinese in the quality sense)

Another long installment in a multi-part series about UPC at times of post-truth Battistelli-led EPO, which pays the media to repeat the lies and pretend that the UPC is inevitable so as to compel politicians to welcome it regardless of desirability and practicability

Implementing yet more of his terrible ideas and so-called 'reforms', Battistelli seems to be racing to the bottom of everything (patent quality, staff experience, labour rights, working conditions, access to justice etc.)

"Good for trolls" is a good way to sum up the Unitary Patent, which would give litigators plenty of business (defendants and plaintiffs, plus commissions on high claims of damages) if it ever became a reality

Microsoft's continued fascination with and participation in the effort to undermine Alice so as to make software patents, which the company uses to blackmail GNU/Linux vendors, widely acceptable and applicable again